1 year ago

2 years ago

I am currently running Rashmi, and as you have mentioned, cascade isn't very good in this deck. So I am looking for another cantrip creature. As of right now Masked Admirers, Nimble Innovator, and Shaman of Spring stand out. On other hand I could just add another bounce creature like Quickling

2 years ago

It's interesting to see an Animar list that has been designed for group games with more than 4 people. My own experiences with Animar have mostly been 1v1 games, which has pushed me more towards an emphasis on speed than on sitting back and finding a chance to combo in one turn like your deck seems designed to do. Still, there are a few cards I highly recommend you try play-testing if you get your hands on a copy.

Shrieking Drake is an amazing inclusion in any Animar deck. It only cost 1 mana to start with, and you can keep using it to bounce itself back to your hand like you would with Man-o'-War. It can't bounce opponents creatures like Man-o'-War, but it can do everything else without Animar having any counters. It is great to have against control decks, because it gives you a cheap way to stock up Animar's counters without having to commit a bunch of creatures to the board and risk losing them all to a wrath spell.

Slithermuse gives you the option of being able to play more aggressively, even in the face of wrath spells. Since there will often be someone in a group game that has a mostly full hand, you can just dump a bunch of spells in one turn and then Evoke Slithermuse to refill your hand. Since Animar's ability also reduces how much you have to pay to evoke a creature, you can often grab 3 or more cards for just 1 blue mana. you can also keep bouncing it back to your hand with cards like Crystal Shard to give yourself a strong card draw engine. I would probably take out Descendant of Soramaro for it, since the Descendant's ability doesn't put cards in your hand and becomes less efficient the less cards you have.

You have Merchant of Secrets in the deck, but for the same cost I think that it would better to run either Sea Gate Oracle or Fierce Empath. The Oracle lets you dig two cards deep instead of just one, and the Empath lets you tutor for your larger combo creatures.

The first card I would take out of the deck would be Words of Wind. Giving up a mana and a card draw while giving opponents the option to choose what card to return to their hand is not what Animar wants to do. You lose to much card advantage if you are giving your opponents the opportunity to return an ETB creature Eternal Witness or Snapcaster Mage to their hand.

Shaman of Spring and Striped Bears have a high casting cost for what they do. Having more creatures that draw you a card is beneficial in an Animar deck, but in my opinion the 4 mana casting cost makes them clunky if you have them in your starting hand. A higher percentage of cheaper creatures helps smooth out Animar's early game. Maybe replace at least one of them with Fauna Shaman?

Evolutionary Leap is useful to have if your creatures are just going to die to a wrath spell, since it lets you get some value out of them, but it also runs the risk of filtering your non-creature combo pieces and tutor spells to the bottom of the library. In my mind it's not worth it, but I will concede the point if you have found it worthwhile in the games you have played.

Gruul Turf, Izzet Boilerworks, and Simic Growth Chamber should be replaced with lands that don't come into play tapped, even if it is just basic lands. I know they help fix mana and that they work well with creatures like Peregrine Drake, but they are slow, can make the mana in your starting hand awkward, and are huge targets for cards like Strip Mine. You probably don't see many land destruction spells in such big group games like the ones you play in though, so maybe that is less a worry for you than it is in the games I play.

Anyway, those are the most prominent suggestions that come to my mind. I hope that you find at least a couple of them are helpful for your deck. I'm really curious about how effective the Llawan, Cephalid Empress in your sideboard has been for you, so if you have the time I'm interested to hear your thoughts on it.

2 years ago

It's a fun combo, but I'm not sure you need it. Depends on where you plan to play this deck. Competitively, like in duel-commander situations, Vorinclex isn't sticky enough to be a useful bomb. But if you know the people you play against are usually very streamlined/combo oriented without much disruption in their set-up he's more likely to stick around and disrupt.

I'd say Fresh Meat or Shaman of Spring for your Elvish Guidance. I never liked Fresh Meat in testing, it's nice to replace your board after a wipe but 3/3 beasts just don't do much in a deck so heavily built around elves. At least Caller of the Claw is itself an elf, you know? If your opponent has any board state the 3/3s are unlikely to come through for the final points of damage since nothing in your deck helps them. And I find it's difficult to keep up 4 mana. So that was a card I took out very early.

And Shaman of Spring is just expensive for a vanilla-ish elf, so replacing it with Guidance would help lower your curve. But she is an elf which technically helps Guidance, so I suggest Fresh Meat first unless it really saves your ass on the regular.

2 years ago

Firstly, I actually have no qualms with infinite combos! Umbral Mantle, Sword of the Paruns, and Staff of Domination are actually all cards I fully intend to put in the deck when I get my hands on them. This list is what I actually own in paper, so these cards are things I will 100% be putting in the list when I get them.

Before when I originally was working on this deck I didn't really like the idea of having Wirewood Channeler in my list, but looking back that now seems a little silly and I should pick up one very soon. I struggle wrapping my head around consistency with Viridian Joiner, but it fully occurs to me this is likely a card I need to play with to understand. I'm not sure how much I lean towards playing Karametra's Acolyte mainly because I just want to limit the amount of non-elves I play in the deck to as small a number as I can possibly manage.

Elvish Pioneer is another creature that I hadn't really considered. At first I was not sure about it because I don't run a lot of lands, but then it occurred to me I want this for my t1 or t2 plays, where hopefully I didn't keep a one land hand, so I will certainly consider it a bit more. Skyshroud Elite Is a card I don't see myself adding, because I've really tried to cut down the amount of elves that I play that don't really do anything other than buff themselves, especially just a little bit. I'm not sure the Elf synergy is enough to convince me to play Kird Ape in EDH.

Arbor Elf is one of those that I just derped on and didn't really think about. I will fix this immediately, I can't imagine that I don't have one laying around somewhere.

Elvish Guidance is a card I just straight up didn't know about, and I will certainly be looking into how I can hunt this one down soon. Same goes for Creeping Renaissance, I REALLY like this suggestion and will be picking one up ASAP, if not sooner.

Aluren was a card I kind of flopped back and forth on, but I did eventually decide against it because I felt like I had enough mana that I didn't really care enough if my things were free. I might still consider it, but I'm not sure I want to experiment with it just yet. I'd rather make the rest of the priority changes first, and see how it slots into a more final/concrete list.

My only other question after looking at your list, is how do you find Ambush Commander? The idea of turning my precious lands into elves makes me incredibly nervous, but I could be wrong and that it just wins on the spot.

Again, I super appreciate all of your feedback! Thank you so much, you've definitely given me some things to think about.

On a final note, Copperhorn Scout sure is the bee's knee's. I completely agree it is also my favourite, right behind Priest of Titania. It offers a lot of neat little things you can do with it just by it's simple attack.

2 years ago

If you really want this to be competitive even against boardwipes, you gotta run some infinite mana combos. Umbral Mantle and Sword of the Paruns get you there if you can find a mana dork that taps for 4 (basically any Priest of Titania effects).

I know people don't like running infinite combos but in Ezuri I think it's necessary at the competitive level, or you're too fucked by boardwipes. The combos enable you to steal a win early or late with like 4 elves, and in one turn if you have haste or enough attackers that stuck (just need one per each player).

Anyway I'm glad to see other people running Copperhorn Scout, it's my favorite elf in my deck except for Priest of Titania. I promise these are all changes I've personally made to my Ezuri deck after a lot of testing, especially against playgroups with many boardwipes, and it's much smoother now and much easier to win.

I'd love to keep discussing changes or answer any questions! I love Ezuri and elves, and I'm committed to finding a fun AND competitive list that makes the most use of elfball tactics but isn't weak to getting Wrath'd :)

Haven't done a proper write-up since I changed it, but check out my list here if you're interested: Aluring Elves

3 years ago

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